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Growing Up Catholic

Or, A Catholic Girl’s Education

  • All of the boys who lost their virginity to a knowing girl—and then lost the girl—wanted to become a priest. No matter how pathetically humorous this was, no one snickered behind their backs. We were too aghast that SEX must have happened. They walked humble and quietly through the halls, holiness oozing around them.
  • No one instructed us in the sexual adventure, least of all our parents. We learned behind closed doors—friend to friend. Or from an older student. Part of that which was verboten belonged to a crippled and faith-riddled logic: if you were interested in the knowledge, you were not interested in the act alone, but in partaking.
  • There was a surprising correlation made between knowledge and action. If you knew about it, you could or would do it. Ignorance and innocence were the blessed life to live. (Of course there were exceptions. Priests studied and learned, gained knowledge. This was in order to combat the ignorance and evil of sinners, as well as the doctrine of the Church.)
  • Grace was what enabled you to fight evil. That and naturally, remaining out of the clutches of the opposite sex: never be alone with a boy/girl, never go to a movie with a boy/girl, never dance closer than a spread-hand width between you. And never, ever, read a book or see a movie that was forbidden.
  • Grace was illustrated by a milk bottle drawn on a chalkboard and grace poured into it. Grace filled the bottle and then spilled over. I didn’t understand the illustration then, and I still don’t.
  • Girls wondered which hole to put a tampon in and which one would work for the boy’s insertion. If in the closest to the front, how would you pee?
  • The few girls who got preggers in high school went away to visit a previously-unknown aunt. When they came back, they always came back alone, but many would suddenly have a new baby brother or sister.
  • More than one of those girls said later they did not know they were having sexual intercourse. Maybe they weren’t we thought. They could have kissed too heavily and the boy then came in his pants. The pants rubbed against the girl and the cum touched her. Voilà! Pregnant! It was the kiss-cum-lately of Catholic childhood.
  • A good Catholic girl dressed so as to tempt no one: skirts just over the knee, blouses loose and buttoned up, no cardigans without a blouse underneath. Tennis shoes were okay, but no sandals. (I have no idea why—perhaps the erotic temptation of toes?) Legs together, bodies apart, a good rule of thumb.
  • The long and the short of it: No sex before marriage, and the husband always has a right to the wife’s body.

And there it was, the hierarchy of knowledge according to Father James:

Posted by Philosophy Matters

Aftermath—oops—Afternote

One might think that some or all of this has no consequence, after all. After all, who does it harm, this education of the soul? I might share this, only one of many experiences with the consequences of a Catholic education.

While working for the Department of Social Services in Wisconsin, we had a mother come to us with her baby. The baby was in the hospital, recovering from the sexual abuse by the father, husband to the woman.

The Father went to the Catholic Social Services Department for assistance and what he called his repentance. We were obliged to work with them. In my dreams I still hear the voice of the social worker I spoke with, that strong, firm, stuttering voice. “All that matters is that the mother and child come back. All that matters is the sanctity of the marriage. A Catholic marriage is a sacrament that cannot be broken. They must come home.”

The Mother and child went home.

And that my friends, is the way things are.

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Smiles

Plans for notes today went awry with the sudden appearance of this little dude posted on Old Moss Woman’s Secret Garden. “Great the Blue Heron, whose roots run deep into the bog/ Who does he call, waiting and wailing from the driftwood?”

This is a baby blue heron from Nature of Nature site.

Isn’t he adorable? Ah, nature, once again you explode my insides with a glance.

And, in keeping with the “What Is Right” post, I’ve signed up for the Climate Demonstration on the 20th of September in downtown Cleveland. The kid is seeing if she can get the day off to join me. How’s that for a hippy dream—moms and daughter protesting together.

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What Is Right

“Never, never be afraid to do what’s right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society’s punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way.”

― Martin Luther King Jr.

  • Ecological Consciousness

And here we are, once again. On the edge of change—change—death—pain—endings. The world, the earth on the edge of destruction.

Once, some time ago when I was dealing with the conflict between WANT and what was RIGHT, I sought to rationalize. What I desired won even though I could not make peace with myself, my own need to make things acceptable. I kept hearing “The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.” Thoreau- Civil Disobedience.

And so it was that I assumed the role of traitor to self and beliefs. Not to indoctrination, not to religion, but to my own sense of morals, that which is Right. Soul Right. Ah, how much simpler life would be without sex.

And how much easier it is to assume the role of Social Protester for that which is Right. Indeed Right. Not at all that of smudged revolutions or in the mud of confusion. But Soul Right. That which cannot be disputed or rationalized. Knowing that I must stand up, I must protest, I must no longer hide behind the silence of belief. True belief, True right, those things belong to action. Nothing else is acceptable.

Sometimes compromise doesn’t bring ease of being, but with shame it brings strength. The strength to do what is right.

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Soul Writing

“Your writing voice is the deepest possible reflection of who you are. The job of your voice is not to seduce or flatter or make well-shaped sentences. In your voice, your readers should be able to hear the contents of your mind, your heart, your soul.” — Meg Rosoff

(Art by Julia Inglis.)

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Sadness And Beauty

Old Moss Woman’s Secret Garden

An earth nest reflected empty as a future without bees, all swirling around the great galactic cosmic nothing, stretched between the prime pillars on high.

Art in the eyes of the beholder observing life’s weave of tomorrow’s dreamscape.

~Unknown artist.

Superleuk

Quote and photo posted from Moss Woman’s site. New illustrator, artist to me—Superleuk. Thoughts brought from the memories of Colorado: The time the major highway through the state was closed in Colorado Springs due to the tumble weeds blocking the road. (There had been a great windstorm that day, and the one before.) I loved it. Where else? The straw or vine dried weaves of lean-tos, bridges, huts, and tunnels, laid out on the uni campus lawn like the photo shows, or more intricately expressed, as on Superleuk’s site. Memories that came like the wind and fog, swirling and breathing, all brought on the feathers of a bluejay’s call… Other states, other dreams, other rivers, a sudden transport in time. Only a whisper left to wonder in amazement with a scent of jasmine lingering there. Returned, the body first, then the spirit slow, reluctant to be so earth bound.